Rs. 3.50 crore spends in district Ludhiana to gift bicycles to girl students: Dhillon

Ludhiana, August 11, 2013: The Punjab Government has spent Rs. 3.50 crore for giving away bicycles to the girl students in district Ludhiana.

Disclosing this here today, Sharanjit Singh Dhillon, Public Works  Minister, Punjab said that under this scheme in district Ludhiana Rs. 3 crore 50 lakh and 66 thousand and 4 hundred 50 rupees has been spent on providing bicycles to 13,001 girls students of class 11th and 12th in the year 2011-12.

Dhillon said that Over 1.5 lac girl students of Punjab are all set to ride on new bicycles to their school with Punjab government finalising the plan to distribute these bicycles within 3 months. The state government has already set aside Rs.47 crore for Mai Bhaggo Viddya Scheme under which all girl students of Government schools of Class 9th to 12th would be gifted bicycles by the Punjab Government.

Dhillon further said that The Punjab Government has already distributed over 1 lakh 11 thousand and 49 bi-cycles to the girl students studying in class 11th and 12th with the cost of Rs. 30 crore last year. He said that Mai Bhaggo Viddya Scheme is the dream project of Chief Minister Parkash Singh Badal. He said that this project was envisaged specially to promote education among the girls and to diminish the school dropout rate among girl students of the state.

Dhillon said that this scheme has been successful as the school dropout rate among the girl child has considerably reduced. He said that the Punjab Government has decided to continue this scheme and the girls studding in class 9th to 12th would be covered. He said that to provide the bi-cycles to the girls from 9th to 12th Budget of Rs. 47 crore has been earmarked by the Punjab government for this financial year.

He said that instructions have been issued to the District Education Officers to prepare the lists of the girls students from class 9th to 12th so that bi-cycles to the remaining could be provided as the earliest. He said that the Punjab government has also rolled out several other welfare schemes for the overall development of the students studding in the government schools. He said that pre matric, post matric scholarships also been extended to the needy and meritorious students.